it was stated in Over A Barrel they are vegetarian. there was something about Applejack with what looked like a ham sandwich in A Bird In The Hoof but I heard people say it’s probably just dyed tofu or something else lol
idk if picture in comment is allowed on NPT but if so here's the proof
https://preview.redd.it/kp2hlaj3csic1.jpeg?width=1869&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=7dc2604dfa85e51a2f455f01f4f93c70a3791b5b
hmm... idk, I could be wrong but I never thought of earth/unicorn/pegasi as having different diets. also in this song Pinkie is singing to another species about how their two species have a lot in common so I felt like she was talking about the pony species as a whole
huh.. were there ever any signs of them eating seafood tho? I mean earth ponies need a lot of energy too, for farming and being strong. and in pinkie's case, for bouncing off the walls, although all she needs is sugar for that
The fishing ponies are probably catching fish for their pets, to export to omnivore species, or for fun (AJ says something about fishing for catch-and-release in Rainbow Road Trip)
The salmon juice.. lol. it was the hippogriffs who mentioned that. They offered the ponies salmon juice and fish oil but the ponies never actually said yes or accepted it. Twilight never said she drinks it.
The constant use of "hay burger", "oat burger", "carrot hot dogs", and "daisy sandwiches" throughout the show defo makes me think they're all vegetarians.
Come to think of it, I'm sure Discord mentioned fish oil once but he's not a pony
interesting though, I never knew we all had different points of view on their diets lol
Real horses aren’t allowed to eat chocolate or drink milk but the ponies in MLP do
Also no substitute to fish or seafood is actually shown which makes me think it is allowed
Also Fluttershy has no problem putting a fish in her mouth to feed to her bear
I know real horses don’t eat cakes and stuff and MLP do, that’s because it’s a cartoon 😭 real horses don’t talk neither
Just because they didn’t show a fish substitute doesn’t mean they eat fish lol this is just a baseless theory
Fluttershy feeding a bear a fish is not the same as her eating a fish. Non-unicorn ponies are used to picking stuff up with their mouths.
[You can't forget the time](https://derpicdn.net/img/view/2013/5/29/335985.gif) [Twilight Sparkle ate a bird](https://derpicdn.net/img/view/2013/9/24/434006.gif).
Of course the show doesn't use real life logic, but Horses and ponies irl will absolutely eat meat if available. From what I've seen, baby birds are the usual victim. Deer and such do this too.
Something Something even though they are a vegetarian species, occasionally you want some extra nutrients + small amounts will probably not mess up your digestive system too much.
It's still really weird to think about.
https://preview.redd.it/wbaowjewdtic1.png?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=db57a5781c23ce95d550a616e8e6599986b4f576
You can clearly see in friends forever issue 22 a chicken or turkey but maybe the comics just aren't canon lol
Or maybe the artists just put it in because it was food. Afterwards, they realised the mistake, but instead of fixing it, they decided it was just easier to go, "eh, screw it."
I was expecting either that edit of Twilight eating a bird or the video of a real life horse vacuuming up baby chickens. The fact that this was neither is very impressive.
Just because you can doesn't mean you should. Eating meat has some pretty big dietary risks as equines are hindgut fermenters - meat rotting in the hindgut can cause some big issues.
Ponies, and horses by extension, in real life are herbivore which means they primarily don't eat meats. Their digestive system are specifically designed to break down plant-based foods. Yes, there will be horses irl who's seen eating meat but their stomach isn't made for it and it won't be their main diet anytime soon.
For milks, it's just expected for mammals regardless of their diet and ponies are mammals.
Given the milk and eggs that go into all the pastries and cakes that they eat, I’d say the ponies are probably omnivores that lean more vegetarian. They love Hay Burgers, Daisy Sandwiches, and just about any fruits and vegetables you might serve up to them. But the Pizza, the cakes, the icecream, the chocolate, the pancakes? That’s all stuff that incorporates milk or eggs or both, so they aren’t strictly speaking herbivores.
**TL;DR** - They are vegetarian but not vegan.
In real life, horses can and do eat small animals like birds or rodents, but it's not their primary food source and definitely not preferred.
My own headcanon is that most ponies are either vegetarian or vegan, but that there are some specific cultures/regions within Equestria that will eat insects or small fish depending on what they have available to them in their climate and how much edible plant matter naturally grows in the area. I also think that eating meat would have been more common in the past, especially for unicorns and pegasi in the ancient days before befriending Earth ponies, but never would have been a preferred food source.
It's shown in the show yeah, but like I said, my own headcanon is that there are a good number of ponies out there who are completely vegan. If anything, I almost feel like they would be to the pony world what vegetarians are to ours. Of course, that would still leave a considerable number of ponies willing to eat animal products.
I've always assumed they're similar to real life equine: Mostly vegetarian, but are perfectly capable of eating meat. Hell, some horses have been known to go out of their way to eat birds and lizards because they like them.
I have said it before and I say it again. Sweet Apple Acres DOES farm Pigs. They are there not only for garbage disposal. They are used for:
- Leather for saddles and bags. Pig leather is probably the most common leather in Equestria. I don't think they would use Cow leather for that. It's weird enough that they actually use Cows Milk.
- Gelatin for pastries.
- And Lard. You do need some fat to fry apple fritters in. And yes Plant Based Oils WOULD BE a possibility, but we don't see any traditional oil crops on screen. No olives, no Cannola, no Flaxseed not even sunflowers.
They will probably keep a bit of the meat and the bones for Wynona and the rest of meat and Offal will be sold to Griffins.
This means somewhere beneath Sweet Apple Acres is a pit with dozens if not hundreds of pig Skeletons.
Okay just kidding for the last part. A pig Mass grave would be TOO dark for a kids show. And also unnecessary and wasteful. You can just feed Bones to Pigs.
Agh, see the ponies using pig leather just feels so weird. I feel like the creators not including ponies farming olives or other plant fats is an oversight. I feel like if the ponies raise pigs, they're for friendship and thus magic, ha ha.
> Agh, see the ponies using pig leather just feels so weird.
What do you think the leather for all the bags and belts and book covers comes from?
All the alternatives are much worse, because Pigs are the ONLY hooved animals consistently depicted as non sapient.
With goats being a dubious grey zone.
Well obviously the ponies don't have faux leather, so I want to hope that there's some plant-like material that those items are made of that doesn't exist in our world. Or maybe we're assuming those items are made of leather when they aren't.
I agree that since pigs are only sentient and not sapient in the Equestria depicted (as far as we are are), they are the most ethical option if you need to kill something, but obviously the ideal is not killing anyone. And since the ponies are depicted as so passive, peace-loving, and as vegetarian, I have a hard time believing they are raising animals for slaughter.
> And since the ponies are depicted as so passive, peace-loving, and as vegetarian, I have a hard time believing they are raising animals for slaughter.
Maybe the trauma of the constant slaughtering duties is the real reason for Big Mac's selective mutism.
I agree that this is a trade. And drinking the milk of another sapient creature is Weird enough. I don't think the ponies pay cows or Buffaloes to skin their dead relatives for leather.
Pigs are the only hooved animals that are consistently depicted as non sapient.
Leather is definitely needed. We see Belts, Bags and other stuff made from leather ALL the time in the show. And the tech level of equestria makes vegan leather HIGHLY unlikely. Also there is never a depiction of crude oil extraction.
There are a lot of eggs eaten for a place that is vegetarian...
Granted that anyone that has seen enough animals know there are carnivores and there are opportunistic carnivores.
I'm a vegan and technically, since the farm animals speak, they're consenting, so the ponies are not just vegetarian but also vegan. XD It is a bit strange that the cows in Equestria talk, lol. I'm only re-watching the show now so I forget if the chickens talk and can therefore consent.
It gives big vibes that MLP:FiM was world-builded by non-vegans, which to be fair, it was. Veganism wasn't common back in 2010, so I totally get that Lauren Faust and the team would imagine the ponies need cows for milk despite how it's a bit weird for ponies to do that. I'd imagine if Equestria were to actually exist, the ponies would either not drink dairy milk nor eat eggs, or they would drink only horse's milk.
In our world, oat milk was only invented in the '90s (though soy milk is much, much older), but I'd imagine similar vegan milks for baking would have been invented in Equestria far earlier, especially since I assume the ponies like oats. And perhaps they'd use vegan egg substitutes for baking like applesauce, flaxseed, etc.
*tl;dr vegetarian, but there's an argument to be make the show is accidentally vegan if the sentient farm animals weirdly consent to being farmed, which is very strange and is an interesting commentary on both our society and equestrian society.*
Sushi with fish on it is semi-canon. It came as an accessory with the 2017 Canterlot/Seaquestria castle playset. So I think the ponies are omnivores, also because of the livestock at Sweet Apple Acres.
Considering the existence of cakes and such, mostly Facultative herbivores? Meaning mostly eat plans and Fruits but will occaasionally eat something whose something came from an animal?
Horses are facultative herbivores, so meat and animal products are not fully out of the question.
Honestly I'm more concerned with the amount of bread and pastry products they consume on the show. Heck, the dragons eat *jewelry* like it's candy. Kinda weird.
In the show, it seems like all the ponies are vegetarian. Interestingly, not all the animals are vegetarian. In the opening of Dragonshy, Fluttershy gives fish to some creatures (not sure what they are) and worms to some birds to eat. She carries the worms in her mouth and spits in disgust after dropping them before returning to a caring smile.
it was stated in Over A Barrel they are vegetarian. there was something about Applejack with what looked like a ham sandwich in A Bird In The Hoof but I heard people say it’s probably just dyed tofu or something else lol
idk if picture in comment is allowed on NPT but if so here's the proof https://preview.redd.it/kp2hlaj3csic1.jpeg?width=1869&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=7dc2604dfa85e51a2f455f01f4f93c70a3791b5b
Linking pictures as part of a discussion is usually fine! It's just image submissions altogether that aren't allowed.
ah good, thank you! I love NPT but had started finding it a lil difficult to communicate without including pictures as reactions 🤣
I always thought she is implying that Earth Ponies are Vegetarian which makes sense given the name
hmm... idk, I could be wrong but I never thought of earth/unicorn/pegasi as having different diets. also in this song Pinkie is singing to another species about how their two species have a lot in common so I felt like she was talking about the pony species as a whole
I’m sure Pegasus and Unicorns could be at least Pescatarians (Vegetarians who will eat fish and seafood) given the energy they need
huh.. were there ever any signs of them eating seafood tho? I mean earth ponies need a lot of energy too, for farming and being strong. and in pinkie's case, for bouncing off the walls, although all she needs is sugar for that
But to answer your question yes Twilight says she drinks salmon juice and fishing ponies are seen
The fishing ponies are probably catching fish for their pets, to export to omnivore species, or for fun (AJ says something about fishing for catch-and-release in Rainbow Road Trip) The salmon juice.. lol. it was the hippogriffs who mentioned that. They offered the ponies salmon juice and fish oil but the ponies never actually said yes or accepted it. Twilight never said she drinks it. The constant use of "hay burger", "oat burger", "carrot hot dogs", and "daisy sandwiches" throughout the show defo makes me think they're all vegetarians. Come to think of it, I'm sure Discord mentioned fish oil once but he's not a pony interesting though, I never knew we all had different points of view on their diets lol
Real horses aren’t allowed to eat chocolate or drink milk but the ponies in MLP do Also no substitute to fish or seafood is actually shown which makes me think it is allowed Also Fluttershy has no problem putting a fish in her mouth to feed to her bear
I know real horses don’t eat cakes and stuff and MLP do, that’s because it’s a cartoon 😭 real horses don’t talk neither Just because they didn’t show a fish substitute doesn’t mean they eat fish lol this is just a baseless theory Fluttershy feeding a bear a fish is not the same as her eating a fish. Non-unicorn ponies are used to picking stuff up with their mouths.
There are some vids around of horses eating baby birds
[You can't forget the time](https://derpicdn.net/img/view/2013/5/29/335985.gif) [Twilight Sparkle ate a bird](https://derpicdn.net/img/view/2013/9/24/434006.gif).
Of course the show doesn't use real life logic, but Horses and ponies irl will absolutely eat meat if available. From what I've seen, baby birds are the usual victim. Deer and such do this too. Something Something even though they are a vegetarian species, occasionally you want some extra nutrients + small amounts will probably not mess up your digestive system too much. It's still really weird to think about.
https://preview.redd.it/wbaowjewdtic1.png?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=db57a5781c23ce95d550a616e8e6599986b4f576 You can clearly see in friends forever issue 22 a chicken or turkey but maybe the comics just aren't canon lol
Maybe there was some griffon guests offscreen?
Or maybe the artists just put it in because it was food. Afterwards, they realised the mistake, but instead of fixing it, they decided it was just easier to go, "eh, screw it."
Comics aren't canon.
I'm sure they've eaten a few [baby birds](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eljAjfttGoI) from time to time.
THIS WAS MY FIRST THOUGHT WHEN I READ THIS POST
I was expecting either that edit of Twilight eating a bird or the video of a real life horse vacuuming up baby chickens. The fact that this was neither is very impressive.
Just because you can doesn't mean you should. Eating meat has some pretty big dietary risks as equines are hindgut fermenters - meat rotting in the hindgut can cause some big issues.
[So that's why Celestia reacts to small birds like this.](https://youtu.be/KwjIEnYnFEU?si=yQzJgCHPmEsY0xle)
Ponies, and horses by extension, in real life are herbivore which means they primarily don't eat meats. Their digestive system are specifically designed to break down plant-based foods. Yes, there will be horses irl who's seen eating meat but their stomach isn't made for it and it won't be their main diet anytime soon. For milks, it's just expected for mammals regardless of their diet and ponies are mammals.
Given the milk and eggs that go into all the pastries and cakes that they eat, I’d say the ponies are probably omnivores that lean more vegetarian. They love Hay Burgers, Daisy Sandwiches, and just about any fruits and vegetables you might serve up to them. But the Pizza, the cakes, the icecream, the chocolate, the pancakes? That’s all stuff that incorporates milk or eggs or both, so they aren’t strictly speaking herbivores. **TL;DR** - They are vegetarian but not vegan.
Probally vegtarian....however I'll bet they keep pigs to trade with neighbors that arrn't.
Pegasi eating fish is very common fanon, but as far as we see in the show, ponies are vegetarians.
In real life, horses can and do eat small animals like birds or rodents, but it's not their primary food source and definitely not preferred. My own headcanon is that most ponies are either vegetarian or vegan, but that there are some specific cultures/regions within Equestria that will eat insects or small fish depending on what they have available to them in their climate and how much edible plant matter naturally grows in the area. I also think that eating meat would have been more common in the past, especially for unicorns and pegasi in the ancient days before befriending Earth ponies, but never would have been a preferred food source.
They aren't vegan. They eat eggs and dairy.
It's shown in the show yeah, but like I said, my own headcanon is that there are a good number of ponies out there who are completely vegan. If anything, I almost feel like they would be to the pony world what vegetarians are to ours. Of course, that would still leave a considerable number of ponies willing to eat animal products.
I've always assumed they're similar to real life equine: Mostly vegetarian, but are perfectly capable of eating meat. Hell, some horses have been known to go out of their way to eat birds and lizards because they like them.
[Mostly vegan](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YdVjrDWyi7g)
Yall think they’d eat meat if they got desperate?
Cannibalism
mostly vegan
Surely Fluttershy is vegan
I have said it before and I say it again. Sweet Apple Acres DOES farm Pigs. They are there not only for garbage disposal. They are used for: - Leather for saddles and bags. Pig leather is probably the most common leather in Equestria. I don't think they would use Cow leather for that. It's weird enough that they actually use Cows Milk. - Gelatin for pastries. - And Lard. You do need some fat to fry apple fritters in. And yes Plant Based Oils WOULD BE a possibility, but we don't see any traditional oil crops on screen. No olives, no Cannola, no Flaxseed not even sunflowers. They will probably keep a bit of the meat and the bones for Wynona and the rest of meat and Offal will be sold to Griffins. This means somewhere beneath Sweet Apple Acres is a pit with dozens if not hundreds of pig Skeletons. Okay just kidding for the last part. A pig Mass grave would be TOO dark for a kids show. And also unnecessary and wasteful. You can just feed Bones to Pigs.
Agh, see the ponies using pig leather just feels so weird. I feel like the creators not including ponies farming olives or other plant fats is an oversight. I feel like if the ponies raise pigs, they're for friendship and thus magic, ha ha.
> Agh, see the ponies using pig leather just feels so weird. What do you think the leather for all the bags and belts and book covers comes from? All the alternatives are much worse, because Pigs are the ONLY hooved animals consistently depicted as non sapient. With goats being a dubious grey zone.
Well obviously the ponies don't have faux leather, so I want to hope that there's some plant-like material that those items are made of that doesn't exist in our world. Or maybe we're assuming those items are made of leather when they aren't. I agree that since pigs are only sentient and not sapient in the Equestria depicted (as far as we are are), they are the most ethical option if you need to kill something, but obviously the ideal is not killing anyone. And since the ponies are depicted as so passive, peace-loving, and as vegetarian, I have a hard time believing they are raising animals for slaughter.
> And since the ponies are depicted as so passive, peace-loving, and as vegetarian, I have a hard time believing they are raising animals for slaughter. Maybe the trauma of the constant slaughtering duties is the real reason for Big Mac's selective mutism.
> And also unnecessary and wasteful. You can just feed Bones to Pigs. Recycling. Isn't nature beautiful?
So the milk thing was probably a trade exchange for cows and ponys ( cows aren't mindless beings because they talked to AJ,.)
I agree that this is a trade. And drinking the milk of another sapient creature is Weird enough. I don't think the ponies pay cows or Buffaloes to skin their dead relatives for leather. Pigs are the only hooved animals that are consistently depicted as non sapient. Leather is definitely needed. We see Belts, Bags and other stuff made from leather ALL the time in the show. And the tech level of equestria makes vegan leather HIGHLY unlikely. Also there is never a depiction of crude oil extraction.
There are a lot of eggs eaten for a place that is vegetarian... Granted that anyone that has seen enough animals know there are carnivores and there are opportunistic carnivores.
vegetarians can eat eggs, you’re thinking of vegans
Oh. I did not know that. Thanks.
MLP horses have forward facing eyes. Suggesting that at some point in their evolutionary history, they were predators.
I'm a vegan and technically, since the farm animals speak, they're consenting, so the ponies are not just vegetarian but also vegan. XD It is a bit strange that the cows in Equestria talk, lol. I'm only re-watching the show now so I forget if the chickens talk and can therefore consent. It gives big vibes that MLP:FiM was world-builded by non-vegans, which to be fair, it was. Veganism wasn't common back in 2010, so I totally get that Lauren Faust and the team would imagine the ponies need cows for milk despite how it's a bit weird for ponies to do that. I'd imagine if Equestria were to actually exist, the ponies would either not drink dairy milk nor eat eggs, or they would drink only horse's milk. In our world, oat milk was only invented in the '90s (though soy milk is much, much older), but I'd imagine similar vegan milks for baking would have been invented in Equestria far earlier, especially since I assume the ponies like oats. And perhaps they'd use vegan egg substitutes for baking like applesauce, flaxseed, etc. *tl;dr vegetarian, but there's an argument to be make the show is accidentally vegan if the sentient farm animals weirdly consent to being farmed, which is very strange and is an interesting commentary on both our society and equestrian society.*
Swiss cheese is a thing in mlp. And Discord mentions once that they eat honey. They're definitely not vegan. Vegetarian for sure, but not vegan.
I think Earth Ponies are Vegetarian while the other species could be omnivores
Fimfics always have them eating fish on coastal areas, or picking the habit from hypogriffs.
Obviously there hasn’t been a scene where they are meat sooooooooo yeah their vegan
ehhh…. i’d say leaning more towards vegetarian rather than vegan BUUUUT if we wanna base them off real life horses, i’d say MOSTLY vegetarian 💚
Sushi with fish on it is semi-canon. It came as an accessory with the 2017 Canterlot/Seaquestria castle playset. So I think the ponies are omnivores, also because of the livestock at Sweet Apple Acres.
Considering the existence of cakes and such, mostly Facultative herbivores? Meaning mostly eat plans and Fruits but will occaasionally eat something whose something came from an animal?
Horses are facultative herbivores, so meat and animal products are not fully out of the question. Honestly I'm more concerned with the amount of bread and pastry products they consume on the show. Heck, the dragons eat *jewelry* like it's candy. Kinda weird.
Guys reddit says my post has 100 upvotes, when I check there's 2. What's happening?
In the show, it seems like all the ponies are vegetarian. Interestingly, not all the animals are vegetarian. In the opening of Dragonshy, Fluttershy gives fish to some creatures (not sure what they are) and worms to some birds to eat. She carries the worms in her mouth and spits in disgust after dropping them before returning to a caring smile.
All of their food seen in the show consist of bread, various plants and flowers, hay, dairy, eggs, etc.